Puma Pride, page 19
“Something more to investigate,” Bryan shook his head. “Guess you’re contacting your parents.”
“Probably,” Mia agreed. “Here we go.”
“See I can see Jolyn’s name,” Selene walked to the screen and pointed out the letters.
“But not her full name,” Brady steered them away from using her name.
“I know,” Selene sighted. “It’s close.”
“What do we think they would use,” Bryan attempted to pry out information from Selene.
“Bernie loved puzzles,” Selene stared at the screen. “I feel like something’s missing here.”
“You’re seeing everything we showed you last time,” Bryan said careful not to lie.
“Dad did love puzzles. He did a variety of them in many of his messages,” Jolyn agreed with Selene.
“Do you remember the scavenger hunts he sent you on for some of your birthdays,” Selene asked. “You went to him and he’d tell you a clue and you had to find your birthday gifts.”
Jolyn shook her head slowly. “I don’t remember.”
“Willie, do you?”
“No but I wasn’t always there when you visited,” Willie snarled.
“This reminds me of those scavenger hunts,” Selene sighed.
After over an hour of trying different possibilities, Selene slumped in a chair rubbing her forehead. “I know a guy who could hack it, if you want?”
“No,” Jolyn said. “Leave this to me. I’m sure something will come to me.”
“Oh, we should give it a rest for now,” Selene agreed. “But I think we should try again in a few days.”
“We’ll have to see how it fits in our schedule,” Bryan evaded setting a date.
“Willie,” Jolyn asked softly. “Do you have all my things?”
“In storage,” he assured her. “Safe and secure.”
“Brady and I will be in touch,” she rubbed her forehead as though it hurt.
“Planning to finally clean it out,” Selene asked.
“Probably,” Jolyn leaned away from Selene.
“We might change up our rooms,” Brady offered an explanation. “I want her comfortable.”
“Let me know and we’ll set something up,” Willie said as he rose. “We should return. We have a baseball game to go to for the twins.”
“Oh my, yes we do,” Selene agreed. In a rush she gave Jolyn air kisses and grinned at Brady. Jolyn stood for Willie and gave him a big hug.
“Don’t stress about any of this,” he assured her.
“Thank you,” she kissed his cheek.
“Your things will be available to you at any time,” Willie held her in place as he told her and shifted his gaze to Brady. “I’ll make sure the area is safe, particularly when you give me the date.”
“We trust you,” Brady assured the older man.
“I’ll walk you out,” Mia walked with Selene out the door.
“This needs to be resolved,” Willie swept his arm back to indicate the research. “Your Pride has suffered enough. I assume you’ll accompany her. If you want more security here, my bears are available.”
“We will,” Bryan said. “But we also think the fewer who know, the better.”
“I agree.” Willie confessed, “I never told Selene when I moved you, it will be like those times.”
“He won’t talk when there are men in the room,” Brady growled. “We’ve only ever gotten him to talk when there’s women in the room. We don’t even have a name.”
“You want Cordele to go talk to him,” Garriety hugged Holly to him.
“Mia, Cordele, and Jolyn,” Brady grumbled.
“She has a way of soothing kids,” Cordele reminded him. “We’re hoping she can do it for him too.”
“We’ll be watching on vid,” Bryan reassured them. “None of us men like it but if we can get answers from him with the women asking, it might help us defend against these attacks.”
“She spoke to him when they were initially taken,” Brady said. “He seemed to respond to her.”
“Stop it,” Mia pushed the three men over in front of the monitors. “We’re doing this to see what we can find out.”
“Yes, alpha,” Garriety and Brady nodded.
Bryan smirked and took his wife in his arms, “Yes, alpha. But be careful.”
Mia walked through the door followed by Cordele and Jolyn. Their dungeon as Jolyn teased was made up of three cells. At the moment, all three cells were open to each other to give the young man more space. But he stopped at the middle door when they stepped through.
Mia stared him down until he lowered his head. “I’m alpha of Puma Pride. You may call me Alpha.”
He glanced up at her. “What do you want me to do?”
“Stop being an idiot,” Cordele said.
“He’s male,” Mia snorted “Is that possible?”
“Tell us about the group you came with,” Mia asked.
“You’ve already got the others. Did you put them to death?” He held his ground but his coloring changed slightly.
“You don’t have to be afraid,” Jolyn spoke. “No one was put to death. They were sent to their appropriate pride, pack, or herd.”
“What do you want to know,” he asked.
“Let’s start with something simple,” Mia asked. “Your name?”
“They called me CL,” he snorted.
“Meaning clouded leopard,” Jolyn asked. “We will not be calling you that. Do you have a preferred name?”
“Until they took her away, my mother called me Keyne,” he spoke softly as though he conveyed a secret.
“Keyne,” Mia looked him over. “Seems like a good fit, which is probably why she gave it to you. How old were you the last time you saw her?”
“I think seven,” he said.
“Where were you held,” Mia asked.
Keyne stopped talking. He stepped back from the bars and hung his head.
Cordele stepped forward, close enough to the bars he could grab her. “Do you want to know how to shift,” she asked.
“Yes,” he snapped out the answer.
“You need to trust us,” Cordele said.
“They told us all the shifters were fake. They told us we were born to human and shifter so we couldn’t shift,” he blurted out.
“They lied to you,” Cordele stepped behind Mia, took off her clothes and shifted.
“Mia can shift as well,” Jolyn said. “But not right now.”
“Cordele’s parents are mixed,” Mia informed him as Cordele paced back and forth in front of his cell. “We want to help you.”
“They said that,” Keyne sat on the floor and gently touched Cordele’s fur. “It always hurts when they helped us.”
Cordele pushed her nose through the bars and sniffed him. He rubbed her head, scratched her chin.
“Cordele has a mate and a kit,” Mia told him.
“They want a shifter female,” Keyne jerked his head towards Mia. “They want you. Or the little one. Many of us refused to hunt the little one.”
“Good thing,” Mia growled. “She’s my kit.”
“They think if they get you or your kit, they’ll be able to make more of us but I don’t believe them,” Keyne said. “You can change back. I know the shifters aren’t fake.”
Cordele walked behind Mia and shifted again. She dressed and walked to the front. “I’m trusting you,” she said before she left and came back with her daughter.
“She’s beautiful,” Keyne murmured. “Can I…”
“If we open the door, will you attack?” Mia crossed her arms and tapped her foot.
“No,” he shook his head.
Mia turned to the camera and signaled the men. The door opened and he waited. “Come out,” Mia gave him permission.
“She’s picky about who she likes,” Cordele said. “Don’t get upset if she cries.”
“She’s perfect,” he said as he lifted her from Cordele’s arms. Holly babbled and patted his cheeks. He smiled and couldn’t take his eyes off her.
“We need to know everything you can tell us about where they held you prisoner and what they did to you,” Mia asked.
“Got paper and pencils,” Keyne asked. “I’ll draw everything I can and write it all out.”
“Good,” Mia strode to the door and stopped when he didn’t follow. “Are you coming?”
“You aren’t locking me up again,” he frowned.
“Do you plan to attack us,” Mia demanded.
“No, alpha,” he acknowledged her rank. “Are you sending me back to them?”
“Fuck no,” Mia said. “It’s illegal for them to run experiments on our kind and it’s illegal to own another sentient being.”
“They...” he shook his head. “I can stay here. With all of you? You won’t make me go?”
“We have rules,” Mia said. “If you don’t break them, you won’t get the boot. There are men in the next room.”
“They won’t hurt you,” Jolyn reassured him.
“The men who guarded us, hurt us,” he confessed.
“No one will hurt you here,” Cordele said allowing him to carry Holly. “Unless you drop Holly.”
He made sure he held her securely as he took a step forward. “I can really be free?”
“Yes, but for now, you stay in the compound,” Mia said. “Those men are watching us.”
“Yes, alpha,” he agreed.
His heart beat faster, Brady woke to find his bed empty. He growled and rose. They worked on the hidden folder but left it. Jolyn needed comfort and tenderness when they returned to their rooms. He knew she’d been upset but now she wasn’t in their rooms. He grabbed sleep pants and a robe. In his bare feet, he followed her scent. He didn’t need lights. Stopping for a moment, he took a deep breath and sensed her feelings.
He hurried along until he realized he was headed towards the office. Rushing down the hall, he pushed the door open to find her sitting with the computer in front of her and her head on her arms as she wept.
“Jo,” he breathed her name. Tears he could handle. He hoped.
She shook her head. “My whole life is a lie.”
Glancing at the screen he saw files open and the hidden folder open. “What did you discover?”
“My parents were never happily married. They weren’t even married.” She waved at the screen. Flipping through the files, she brought up a medical report. “They started me in a test tube and when I had the right genetic signatures, they implanted me in her.”
“Invitro is common enough among humans,” Brady tried to reassure her.
“No. They were my biological parents but they weren’t human,” Jolyn brought up other files. “He’s part hound and part human and part Amur leopard. She’s part South China Tiger, zebra, pika, and human. I had to look up the two as they are almost extinct in the wild.”
“Those are odd combinations,” Brady considered.
“Look. Look at this,” Jolyn pulled up another file. “They were made in captivity. The humans used were the carriers of the baby but they extracted the animal DNA and fucked with my grandmothers’ DNA. There are lists of failures.”
“Does it bother you, you’re a mishmash of animals and not fully human,” Brady asked as he skimmed the files. “This biology is too much for me. We may have to bring in Verity to look at it.”
“Don’t you get it?”
“Get what?”
“They took a prostitute, one who wasn’t on drugs. She was a sixteen year old girl, strapped her to a table, and experimented on her. Then they raped her to try to create a shifter with the traits they wanted.”
“Fuck,” Brady read through the synopsis in the report.
“Her offspring, as in multiple offspring, were either stillborn, deformed, or died at a young age. My mom was one of three who survived to adulthood. My dad was luckier, he was one of six.”
“Fuck they matched them genetically. How many fucking tests did they do?”
“None of the offspring could shift,” Jolyn wiped away the tears as anger replaced disbelief and hurt.
“The purposes of the study were to… fuck,” Brady closed his eyes.
“I should have mentioned the pictures,” Jolyn hiccupped and started crying again. “She wasn’t doing all of this to make the shifters better. I mean I sort of knew that when she said she… but fuck. She wanted their stories so those who owned her – her words – owned her, could improve their tests. I was supposed to …” She broke into tears.
Brady pulled her into his arms. He didn’t care what all the files said all he needed to do was comfort her. “Whatever this crap says, doesn’t matter,” he whispered into her hair as he rocked back and forth with her.
“I’m a damn experiment,” she hiccupped through the tears. “I was supposed to be a breeder.”
“What the hell,” Bryan stepped into the office.
“Get Mia,” Brady asked softly.
Bryan retreated and returned after a few moments with Mia. “You got the folder open,” Mia went to the computer.
“Trust me, the pictures…”
“Oh my… oh that’s vile,” Mia gasped as she found a picture of a small child, maybe two sprawled on an autopsy table.
“That’s my sister,” Jolyn choked out. “Mom had twins. They raised us like you’d raise… we lived in cages. It was too risky to allow us out in case we shifted into one of our animals.”
With tears streaming down her face, Mia closed the photo, “Let me look. Bryan, go get some food and drink.”
“On it,” Bryan hurried out of the room.
Brady picked up Jolyn and held her tight to him as he sat on a sofa with her. He rocked to comfort her and she clung to him.
Mia turned on the bigger screen and started arranging things. “Did you understand what’s in these reports?”
Jolyn sniffled and pressed her face into Brady’s neck. “Some of it.”
“Brady, get her a tissue. Jolyn, I know you’ve had a shock but suck it up,” Mia said. “We’ll figure this out.”
“Starting with my grandparents, they experimented on the girls and then raped them and impregnated them,” Jolyn took the tissue from Brady.
“What year,” Mia asked.
Bryan returned with a tray of food and drinks. “What happened?”
“I woke up with an idea for the logon for the hidden folder,” Jolyn said. “I came here and typed it in and it worked. There’s a letter from my dad. It’s titled Read this first.”
“Got it,” Mia said. “You okay with me reading this out loud?”
“Yes,” Jolyn took a glass of water from Bryan and drank half of it.
Mia read, “Jolyn. What you’re about to find out will hurt you but you need to know. Please remember your beginnings don’t make you who you are. Your mother and I… no I need to go back a generation. Your grandmother on my side was a fourteen year old prostitute who was taken off the street and used for experimentation by the government. On your mom’s side, she was seventeen. They experimented on these girls with animal DNA in an attempt to create shifters. Ironically none of us can shift and they have since learned that if the animal doesn’t have the shifter genes, all they would get were deformed aberrations.”
Bryan handed Mia a glass of water. “This would be forty to fifty years ago?”
“Yes, dad would be forty nine this year and mom forty five,” Jolyn shared the information.
“Fuckers,” Brady said.
“Want me to continue,” Mia asked. When Jolyn nodded, she read, “By some miracle actual children were born. Those poor girls were used as breeders and they intended to use your mother and I as breeders. When your mother was eighteen, she was taken to a breeding room. We were friends. We grew up together. We don’t know why they waited until she was eighteen but they harvested her eggs and my sperm took it to the lab and combined it. By some miracle when they implanted it in her, she got pregnant with twins. We had you and your sister for two years. They kept us together in a small apartment. We were always monitored. They treated us more like wild animals. No that’s not true. They treated us like monsters. Some of our siblings were monstrous and most died early. Your sister didn’t make it. She had seizures from the beginning. You were the only one who could sooth her.”
Mia stopped talking, glanced at Jolyn who clung to Brady. Her breathing rough as she tried not to cry. Brady rubbed soothing hands up and down her back.
“We sat in our living room playing with the two of you, when she started having seizures. It was just before your second birthday. You tried to sooth her but I think the seizure was too violent. Her autopsy is included in these files. You cried for three days after she died. We were allowed to take you outside for the first time. They disposed of her and we never knew how until your mother… she distracted a guard while I downloaded all the files on our family. I’m sorry you’re facing this. I hope there’s someone in your life who you love to be there for you. We were kept in captivity until you were almost four and then we were sent out to do more work for our owners.”
“Jesus,” Bryan gripped the edge of the desk. “Jesus.”
“Here’s the records of the prostitutes, the experiments they did, and all your parents and their siblings, and all their offspring,” Mia’s hands shook.
Bryan and Brady stared at the screen, skimmed the documents, and swallowed the bile with the results of the experiments. “How could they do this,” Brady demanded.
“Because they were the fucking government,” Bryan said. “At this point, we had gained enough power to get them out. They tried everything to stop us.”
“Instead, they became monsters,” Mia skimmed another document. “I… Jolyn, I’m so sorry. I had no idea.”
“It was all too good,” Jolyn said. “I… I don’t even know who I am anymore.”
“You do,” Brady said. “You’re still the same person. Your genetics may have changed but that doesn’t mean you have.”
“Selene’s one of them,” Mia said. “Here’s reports from Selene, Alice, and Bernard.”
“Look at that,” Bryan pointed to the screen.
“Brent Ladika,” Brady growled.
“He was their handler,” Bryan kept reading. “They were supposed to gather DNA samples from as many of the shifters as they could get.”
